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An assembly in work time
The scene is possible because of a specific legal right. Italy's Statuto dei Lavoratori, passed in 1970, guarantees employees a number of paid hours each year for assemblee held on company premises during working hours, alongside the right to elect workplace representatives — the RSU — and to have union officials enter the workplace. Nothing in this meeting is a concession being granted; it is a procedure being used, which is why the union official can speak about opening a trattativa as a matter of course. The two-layer structure of Italian bargaining is the other thing to carry away. The CCNL from Lesson 66 sets a national floor for a whole sector; a contratto integrativo negotiated at company level can improve on it and cannot go below it. What an assembly like this is deciding is therefore not whether the law protects them but how much more than the minimum they intend to hold. Note also the vocabulary of process — si apre una trattativa, si apre una vertenza, si va al tavolo, la controparte — which treats the employer as the other party to a procedure rather than an adversary. Alex's question is the right one and gets a precise answer: on how work is organised the company decides, and on what that costs the workforce it negotiates.